‘Charming!’ says Twemlow.
‘So like as to be almost a caricature?—Mr Twemlow, it is impossible to tell you what the struggle in my mind has been, before I could bring myself to speak to you as I do now. It is only in the conviction that I may trust you never to betray me, that I can proceed. Sincerely promise me that you never will betray my confidence—that you will respect it, even though you may no longer respect me,—and I shall be as satisfied as if you had sworn it.’
‘Madam, on the honour of a poor gentleman—’
‘Thank you. I can desire no more. Mr Twemlow, I implore you to save that child!’
‘That child?’
‘Georgiana. She will be sacrificed. She will be inveigled and married to that connexion of yours. It is a partnership affair, a money-speculation. She has no strength of will or character to help herself and she is on the brink of being sold into wretchedness for life.’
‘Amazing! But what can I do to prevent it?’ demands Twemlow, shocked and bewildered to the last degree.
‘Here is another portrait. And not good, is it?’
Aghast at the light manner of her throwing her head back to look at it critically, Twemlow still dimly perceives the expediency of throwing his own head back, and does so. Though he no more sees the portrait than if it were in China.
‘Decidedly not good,’ says Mrs Lammle. ‘Stiff and exaggerated!’